Colin’s Projects

I spent the better part of a Saturday afternoon with some aircraft paint remover and a power washer trying to get the old paint off the wheels. This was a pretty futile exercise. The stripper lifted the clear pretty easily, but it is just USELESS on the paint. I think I will have to take them in to get sandblasted.

I was able to get most of the gouges out of the lips of the wheels with some 320 grit paper and an DA sander. I still think I will paint over the lips, however, and just go full silver for the wheels.

I also fitted up one wheel on the front of the car. I think 7″ is really as wide as you can go without hitting the steering linkage. ET25 really is just about right, too. I think I will have to run 195/50s for tires and roll the fenders as well, just to be safe.

I picked up some 15×7 ET24 BBS RZs today. These basically look like the 14s that everyone sees but they came off a Euro 323. The rims need some straightening and obviously to be refinished, but I’m very excited to get them on the car. I can finally get my brakes fixed up after they go on, too.

I picked up a pretty decent looking chrome rear bumper finally. Its certainly not perfect but its straight and looks good from 2 feet away. I still need to finish drilling out some of the mounting holes, but its looking much better than no bumper at all. I’m just waiting for someone to hit it!

I also got a Getrag 240 5 speed transmission. This is less common than the usual Getrag 245, but its much more compact and also a few pounds lighter so that makes it more attractive to me. I’m not building any sort of high horse power engine so the aluminum selector forks should be plenty strong.

I still need to find someone to shorten my driveshaft since I don’t have access to a lathe, but that seems to be the only major hurdle. I’ll use the shift platform that I already have since I already rebuilt the shifter.

Next up are some new BBS wheels!

Here is the 5 speed after I picked it up.

I got some “Purple Power” cleaner and went to work with a brush and the power washer and everything cleaned up nicely.

Here are the photos of where my nose was hit. I believe it happened in a shopping mall parking lot. It was heart breaking. In the second photo, you can see where I pounded out the bottom dent already. I still need to smooth it and repaint it, but structurally, its fine now.

Well I’ve started working on the interior, finally. Here are the armrests before and after dye. I used some of the cheap Duplicolor $6 spray dye. I just wiped the pieces down with some mineral spirits and soapy water.

I realized I haven’t really posted any pics. I’ve been driving the car for several weeks now. There are still a few small things to wrap up on the exterior, including the rear bumper, but its mostly done.

Here’s the obligatory “before and after” set.

Though the rivet nut tool we ordered never arrived, after some trial and error we managed to rig up something to get them in. So here it is, all bolted up and nearly ready to go!

The hood is finally on after some trouble getting the torsion bar on correctly. Here it is after a lot of sanding and the first round of polishing…

The end is in sight!